The Camden Crawl

I seem to have done nothing the last week or so but go to gigs.  I'll upload photos when I can find my camera!

We started with the Camden Crawl - 40 bands on in various venues round Camden all on one evening.  A ticket was £15 and this got you entry into all the venues involved.  There was an added bonus as Milly came down from the Midlands to enjoy it too.

We picked up our wristbands midafternoon and headed to the World's End pub to plan our itinery.    There were 8 venues and 5 different slots at each venue, meaning there were far more clashes than I had originally envisaged as I expected slots to be shorter.  The venues were across Camden with the two extremes being Koko (formerly Camden Palace) and Barfly down on Chalk Farm Road.

First up we headed to the Oh! Bar on Camden High Street to see Weapons of Mass Belief .  I thought their website was broken for the last two weeks but it turns out it *only* works in IE.  Bah.  They are a punky-rap outfit from South Wales doing the nu-metal style thing perhaps 3 years too late (or is it due a comeback).  Black Line Ninja was released on March 7th and is definatly worth a listen.   We only really caught the tail end of their set, annoyingly being held back from entering while they were playing the single because the bouncers were having a chat!

Off then to Koko to attempt to see the end of Do Me Bad Things .  Ricky had seen them the night before and liked them a lot.  Unfortunatly we got there just as everyone was leaving, and instead ended up with Milly having a mass GLC debate with one of J's friends.

Next up we hit Lock 17, at least I think that's what it was called, to see Hard-Fi.  I'd been listening to a bundle of camden crawl band tracks for the week leading up to the event and Hard-Fi's single Tied up Too Tight was the most immediately striking of the lot.  The venue itself was very nice, quite large and quite full.   Milly had seen the band earlier in the week supporting The Bravery, and we bopped along to a really enjoyable set.   There were some sound problems, but nothing really to detract from the greatness of some of the tracks.   There should be an album out in June, I think, and they are playing at the 100 Club on Oxford Street in London on April 28th so I would wholeheartily recommend you get tickets for that if you can.  Unfortunatly I am seeing the Kaiser Chiefs that night, round the corner at the Astoria, but there might be some running between venue antics!

After Hard-Fi we briefly dropped into the Caernavon Castle to see someone who I can't even remember for about 2 songs.  They were quiet and not very interesting.

For the final set we had a lot of people to pick between.  It could have been Graham Coxon, Buzzcocks, The Subways or many others, but we took ourselves down to Barfly to see Le Tigre.  I'd seen them before doing a PA at Popstarz but not really paid that much attention. Since then I have heard a lot more of their material and so really really enjoyed this gig.  It was marred somewhat by some plonker who thought he was being Nathan Barley and was 'dead ironic'.  I particularly enjoyed his 'Get off me you queer cunt' to someone in the audience.  Oh, people!

So all in all it was a fun night.  If you haven't heard of the bands above, the tracks you should check out are:

Hard-Fi : Tied Up Too Tight / Cash Machine
Weapons of Mass Belief : Black Line Ninja
Le Tigre : Decepticon / TKO / On the Verge